A veteran Washington D.C. investigative journalist says the Department of Homeland Security confiscated a stack of her confidential files during a raid of her home in August â€” leading her to fear that a number of her sources inside the federal government have now been exposed.

In an interview with The Daily Caller, journalist Audrey Hudson revealed that the Department of Homeland Security and Maryland State Police were involved in a predawn raid of her Shady Side, Md. home on Aug. 6. Hudson is a former Washington Times reporter and current freelance reporter.
A search warrant obtained by TheDC indicates that the August raid allowed law enforcement to search for firearms inside her home.The document notes that her husband, Paul Flanagan, pleaded guilty in 1986 to resisting arrest in Prince Georgeâ€™s County. The warrant called for police to search the residence they share and seize all weapons and ammunition because he is prohibited under the law from possessing firearms.

But without Hudsonâ€™s knowledge, the agents also confiscated a batch of documents that contained information about sources inside the Department of Homeland Security and the Transportation Security Administration, she said.
Outraged over the seizure, Hudson is now speaking out. She said no subpoena for the notes was presented during the raid and argues the confiscation was outside of the search warrantâ€™s parameter.

â€œThey took my notes without my knowledge and without legal authority to do so,â€ Hudson said this week. â€œThe search warrant they presented said nothing about walking out of here with a single sheet of paper.â€

She provided TheDC with a photo showing the stack of file folders in a bag marked â€œevidence/property.â€
On Thursday, a spokesman for the Maryland State Police declined to address any specifics about the search.
â€œDue to the ongoing criminal investigation and the potential for pending criminal charges at the state and/or federal level, the Maryland State Police will not discuss specific information about this investigation at this time,â€ spokesman Greg Shipley said in a statement to TheDC.
At about 4:30 a.m. on Aug. 6, Hudson said officers dressed in full body armor presented a search warrant to enter the home she shares on the bay with her husband. She estimates that at least seven officers took part in the raid.
After the search began, Hudson said she was asked by an investigator with the Coast Guard Investigative Service if she was the same Audrey Hudson who had written a series of critical stories about air marshals for The Washington Times over the last decade. The Coast Guard operates under the Department of Homeland Security.
Hudson said that investigator, Miguel Bosch, identified himself as a former air marshal official.
But it wasnâ€™t until a month later, on Sept. 10, that Hudson was informed by Bosch that five files including her handwritten and typed notes from interviews with numerous confidential sources and other documents had been taken during the raid.
â€œIn particular, the files included notes that were used to expose how the Federal Air Marshal Service had lied to Congress about the number of airline flights there were actually protecting against another terrorist attack,â€ Hudson wrote in a summary about the raid provided to TheDC.
Recalling the experience during an interview this week, Hudson said: â€œWhen they called and told me about it, I just about had a heart attack.â€
She said she asked Bosch why they took the files. He responded that they needed to run them by TSA to make sure it was â€œlegitimateâ€ for her to have them.
â€œâ€˜Legitimateâ€™ for me to have my own notes?â€ she said incredulously on Wednesday.
Asked how many sources she thinks may have been exposed, Hudson said: â€œA lot. More than one. There were a lot of names in those files.â€â€œThis guy basically came in here and took my anonymous sources and turned them over â€” took my whistleblowers â€” and turned it over to the agency they were blowing the whistle on,â€ Hudson said. â€œAnd these guys still work there.â€

The Daily Caller reached Bosch on his cell phone on Thursday. â€œBefore I talk to you, Iâ€™m probably going to have to run this by our legal department,â€ he said.
Hudson said she and her husband knew something was up in February when the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives wanted to talk about a purchase Flanagan made about five years ago.
The court documents note that ATF investigators asked Flanagan if he obtained â€œpossible machine gun parts from a Swedish National.â€ Flanagan responded that he once purchased a potato gun but threw it away because it didnâ€™t work.
The search warrant notes that Flanagan is an ordinance technician for the Coast Guard in Baltimore, which explains why the Coast Guard Investigative Service became involved in the case.
In July, according to the documents, Bosch interviewed several of Flanaganâ€™s Coast Guard colleagues, who said Flanagan spoke often about being a â€œfirearms collector.â€
â€œOne party that was interviewed remembered distinctly about Flanagan advising he had recently purchased a Bersa .380 handgun, and observed pictures of firearms similar to AK-47 semi-automatic rifles which were identified by Flanagan as being his,â€ the court documents state.
The documents also note that Victor Hodgin, the trooper in the criminal investigation division of the Maryland State Police whose name is on the search warrant, accessed Flanaganâ€™s Facebook account in his investigation.
â€œRecords maintained by www.Facebook.com will allow him to further implicate Paul Roland Flanagan in the illegal possession [of] firearms,â€ he wrote.
Hodgin didnâ€™t return a voicemail left on his phone. Shipley, the spokesman with the Maryland State Police, said the â€œevidence and information developed during this investigation is currently under review by both the Anne Arundel County Stateâ€™s Attorneyâ€™s Office and the United States Attorneyâ€™s Office.â€
â€œA determination will be made by officials in these offices regarding the state and or federal charges that may be placed as a result of this investigation,â€ he said.
Hudson told TheDC that the couple had a run-in with the Maryland State Police about six years ago. â€œA neighbor complained on New Years Eve about one of us shooting a gun off the pier here,â€ she said. â€œWe live right on the bay.â€
Hudson said the police gave them a slap on the wrist then. â€œThey knew then we had these guns,â€ she said. â€œIf this was a problem â€” that he wasnâ€™t supposed to be around them â€” they shouldâ€™ve told us then.â€
During the raid, the officers also went after Hudsonâ€™s three pistols and three long guns, which she obtained legally.
â€œIâ€™m a Kentucky girl,â€ she said. â€œI come kitchen trained, and firearm ready. I grew up with guns and Iâ€™ve always been around guns.â€
Hudson has been a reporter in Washington, D.C. for nearly 15 years and was nominated twice by The Washington Times for the Pulitzer Prize. She is a freelancer for Newsmax and the Colorado Observer.
While at the Times, Hudson reported extensively on the air marshal program â€” specifically about whether Homeland Security officials had lied to Congress and reported protecting more flights than they really were. Using her sources inside the government, Hudson has also reported for years about possible terrorist â€œdry-runsâ€ on airplanes.
Unlike some other reporters whose sources have been targeted in recent years by the government, Hudson said none of the information she had was classified or given to her by someone who broke the law.
â€œNone of the documents were classified,â€ she said. â€œThere were no laws broken in me obtaining these files.â€
Huds said she wants to let her sources know that they may have been exposed.
â€œPart of the reason Iâ€™m coming forward with this is Iâ€™m scared to contact them,â€ she said. â€œIâ€™m terrified to contact themâ€¦Iâ€™ve got to let these guys know somehow.â€

"...for example, since 2000, 10,000 officials were executed for corruption, and another 120,000 were sentenced to prison terms. Even considering the huge population of China these numbers are impressive."

Not all of "we", but any of us who did not vote for Romney, will be able to tell our children and grandchildren, that we voted for the man who transformed this Country.

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You are right. But I say that Obama is a symptom of the real problem, and that is with the mindset of the average American. He was elected fairly, and elections have consequences. The majority of Americans want this. They voted for it twice. I, for the life of me, cannot understand it, but it is so.

What a scary government. This type of activity by agencies including but not limited to the Department of Homeland Security, the NSA, the FBI and the CIA is a long-term pattern and problem. It is not administration specific.